Keep Pace With New Schools

One of our most precious resources is our children. No matter how many times and how many ways we say it, the future of our community rests on the shoulders of our youngsters.

Currently, students living in the city of Delray Beach are bused to schools in Boca Raton and Boynton Beach in order to prevent overcrowding and achieve balance. In some cases, this prevents children from going to school in their home communities.

That is why the city of Delray Beach has worked with the Palm Beach County School Board to create a consistent feeder pattern that will support the concept of neighborhood schools. With that feeder pattern, we are hoping to create schools where children from the same neighborhood attend classes together from kindergarten through 12th grade.

To accomplish this goal, however, and to keep pace with enrollment growth, we must build a new middle school and rebuild Atlantic High School.

It's no secret that my alma mater, our venerable Atlantic High School, is in a state of disrepair. No matter how loyal we feel to our roots, it is time to accept the fact that it is an inadequate structure that is no longer cost-effective to repair.

At the same time, we are in need of a new middle school, and this may be the only opportunity for our city to have a middle school east of I-95.

After studying this situation carefully and evaluating the cost and disruption involved, we believe that the most sensible alternative is to raze the existing Atlantic High School and build a new middle school on that site.

The new middle school is only one way the community will benefit from this plan. The city also intends to partner with the School Board to build a 20-acre soccer park that would be shared by the school and the community. In addition, this plan would allow community use of a nearly new auditorium and provide a brand-new, state-of-the-art high school to carry on the tradition of Atlantic High.

The question now is where the new Atlantic should be built to provide a safe, convenient and centralized location. The best answer so far is on the "Tate parcel" adjacent to and including the Breezy Ridge neighborhood.

This site is centrally located and supports the consistent feeder pattern that has long been our goal. Its proximity to I-95 offers easy access, and would provide a site for a new middle school. It also represents a benefit to the community: Currently, there is no community center for that part of the city. Due to a pending agreement that will be considered at a future meeting, the School Board would reimburse the city for the land and the improvements that were made to the current site of Atlantic High School. In the long run, this will represent a cost savings to the city.

Delray Beach has a proven track record of partnering with the Palm Beach County School Board to create public recreation facilities at its schools. By constructing two new schools for the city, our residents would gain a new location to exercise, meet with neighbors and develop the sense of community that helped make Delray Beach an All America City in 1993 and 2001.

City officials are now meeting with the residents of Breezy Ridge and others to find out what their concerns are with this process. We are working diligently to answer questions and explore options. We want to make the decision that makes the most sense for everyone in our community, including the children who are our future.

The quality of life we experience in the future depends largely on the sense of community we build today. By allowing children to attend schools closer to their own neighborhoods, we are strengthening the bonds that unite us -- and solidifying our distinction as an All America City.